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Monday, June 13, 2011

Jordan's Obligatory E3 reactions

While I’m sure it can't compete with the frantic, crowded craziness of E3, moving back home after finishing my freshman year at Northwestern has proven hectic enough to delay this post by a few days. Plus, after the conference ended, I discovered that I did not have many reactions worth elaborating on. All I really had to say was stuff like “the controller has a screen it, I already knew that but it’s still neat."

Because so much about gaming comes from interaction, there is only so much one can gather from trailers. In addition, the gameplay of stuff like Mario Kart and all of the blasted first person shooters kind of speak for themselves. So I’ve reached this point where there’s so little knowledge to be learned, playing the games is what I’m excited for. And since I’m not able to go to E3, yet, that’s still a ways off.

But if you are still interested this is what I thought about this year’s show. And if you care that much keep refreshing because I may add new stuff if it comes to me and but I won’t tell anyone.

NINTENDO

Wii U is a dumb name, as is Playstation Vita but Wii U is worse, however after living with Wii for five years I’m so beyond caring about names at this point it really doesn’t matter at all.

What matters is games and while the hardware seems perfectly serviceable, great even, I need to see actual games before really getting exciting. Not tech demos like New Super Mario Bros. Mii or Zelda and not ports of third party stuff coming this fall. I understand why Nintendo needs to highlight third parties but solid, first party titles is what excites most people, including me, when it comes to that company.

Like this but, you know, a game

And they have to be games that, like, exist. I can’t get excited about Smash Bros. until it becomes a real game. Otherwise I’ll just literally destroy myself from anticipation for three years like last time and that was only sort of fun.

Battlefield, Warren Spector (NU alum!) games and Ken Levine games coming to Wii U is genuinely exciting though. Thanks to Playstation Move, it appears Levine realizes what Wii owners have known for years that, if made properly, shooters control arguably better on the platform. Hopefully Spector’s next game will have all the heart of Epic Mickey without the fundamentally flawed foundation that I might one day write about in a review-type essay.

People have thrown out the idea of using the two screens and touch screens of Wii U as a next-generation Game Boy player but with DS games. Take it one step further, maybe a future version of it could play 3DS games. But that would require most people to have 3D TVs and that isn’t a future I want to live in.

Being a reversed version of one of my favorite Zelda songs, Zelda’s lullaby, Skyward Sword’s main theme initially sounded very strange. However, the whole Zelda orchestra, besides just being very cool, finally sold me on the song. Between playing Link’s Awakening on the 3DS virtual console and looking forward to Ocarina 3D this Sunday, I’m quite hyped on Zelda these days.

Super Mario 3D looks really good but I’m concerned about this ongoing trend of 2D sensibilities creeping back into 3D Mario games. I know people like the classic stuff and that 2D Mario games sell way better but there was merit to Mario 64’s big, open, exploration-focused levels. Don’t abandon that. Maybe try it on Wii U?

As for the conference as a whole, it’s obvious that even when Nintendo has cool things with hardcore potential, they don’t present them in a way that just caters to hardcore. It was better than, say, their 2008 conference. But some very self-entitled people had this ridiculous idea that they were going to abandon casuals all together and like grovel at the feet of hardcore gamers and beg them to take them back. Once you get over how stupid that is, you’ll realize that, while not perfect by any means, it was probably the best conference.

EVERYONE ELSE

I didn’t actually watch Microsoft’s conference but I heard it was mostly this

And maybe some Halos too.

It’s funny to watch another company and fan base go through what I’d like to call the “Nintendo Cycle” of shift towards casual while trying to look like you aren’t. Not even some Peter Molyneux craziness can stop that.

I have a lot of respect for Uncharted, but I personally don’t care about the franchise at all. Much like Lord of the Rings, the whole Indiana Jones adventure aesthetic is something I recognize as high quality but have little to no interest in whatsoever. It’s apparently just one of my many controversial opinions.

The main character from Infamous being in Street Fighter x Tekken is about as funny and dumb as all the other nonsensical fighting game cameos like Link and Yoda in Soul Calibur.

The Playstation Vita pricing (starting from $250 just like the 3DS) is incredibly smart and aggressive. Nintendo should probably respond somehow. It was a good move in Sony’s otherwise solid but kind of boring show.

But none of this really matters because Duke Nukem comes out today. Stand by for the end of the world.

I’ll admit that this post is incredibly biased. Hence why the Nintendo section is twice as big as everyeone else’s. Outside of starcraft I don’t really follow pc gaming news and from what I heard there wasn’t that much new old republic info.

About Me

Jordan Minor is an entertainment and technology journalist with a focus on video games. He is currently a Junior Software Analyst at PCMag.com in New York. His work has also appeared in Kotaku, The A.V. Club, 148 Apps and more. He is a graduate of the Medill School of Journalism at Northwestern University.